Prompt #1: Explore this theme: “Forgiveness without apology”
I watched her gnarled fingers close tightly over a worn coffee mug, unsteadily raising it up to meet her puckered lips. The same fingers that had once cuffed me around the head, the very same fingers that pointed the evil eye at me before those same lips called me a whore.
Her fingers had been long, white, and delicate then. Piano hands, they used to be called. Her lips were a reddish bloom on a deceptively beautiful and virtuous face. Crimson in clover.
Now, each liver-spotted knuckle was swollen to the size of a peach pit, ravaged by severe rheumatism. That once lovely face was wizened beyond recognition. And the righteous fury that once loomed in her gaze had been replaced by a hateful fear. A desperation to not be lost and forgotten.
Wordlessly, I added a sugar cube to her mug, and helped guide it back to her mouth. She closed her eyes gratefully but offered no word of thanks. Staring at her a moment longer, I whispered, “I forgive you, Nana.”
The crone’s eyes widened, and her mouth contorted into several unnatural shapes before she managed to squawk out, “What did you say?”
“I said, I forgive you.”
Nana scoffed, baring her dentures at me. When I didn’t respond further, she deliberately dropped her coffee on my bedroom rug. We sat in silence as the dark liquid soaked into the once brilliantly green fibers.
“Well, that and a nickel will get you a cup of coffee, you useless bitch.”